Some time ago I talked about a kind of message. One like this one: "It’s interesting what you say, I even read you every day, but I would never buy anything from you because I don't believe I can learn what you know without going through what you've been through." OMG… And then, you wonder why there are adults that cannot tie their shoes… or get any success in life. I'll tell you something crazy: knowledge can be recorded. And another: it can be transmitted. And the last one: whatever you...
1 day ago • 1 min read
Most contractors enter a negotiation with the wrong assumption. They think: “The agency has the money. The agency has the power. The agency has the contract. So the agency has all the leverage.” Not in their dreams… In PPPs and major infrastructure projects, agencies also carry something very heavy: Loss aversion. They do not want a project failure. They do not want the Minister asking questions. They do not want the newspaper headline. They do not want the contractor collapsing. They do not...
2 days ago • 2 min read
January 2009. Tropicana, PepsiCo’s orange juice brand, was the undisputed leader in the US. Its flagship product, Pure Premium, was generating more than $700 million a year. A beautiful business. So what does a company do when everything is going really well? Sometimes, it overthinks. And screws it up. Someone in an office decided that the old packaging, the iconic orange with a straw stuck into it, was outdated. It needed to be modernised. It needed to be brought into the present. You know...
3 days ago • 2 min read
Look. Capital does not flow into PPPs because the project is important. Or because the Government wants it. Or because the infrastructure is badly needed. This is something many get wrong. Capital flows when the project makes sense. When revenues are clear. When risks sit with the parties best able to manage them. When governance works. When the financial model survives serious scrutiny. When the documents answer difficult questions before investors ask them. In summary, when money can...
4 days ago • 1 min read
Look. Leverage is not only what you can actually do. It is what the other side believes you can do. That matters. Especially in big infrastructure projects and SPVs. Every contractor, operator, supplier, authority and shareholder is constantly assessing two things: What can they gain? And what could they lose? Find that out, and you start negotiating properly. Not emotionally. Not aggressively. Properly. You understand what matters to them. You understand what they fear. And you use that...
5 days ago • 1 min read
Look. There are many boring industries. Infrastructure is one of them. PPPs are even worse. Long meetings. Technical reports. Risk registers. Governance papers. Contracts nobody wants to read. Very boring. Good. Boring markets are often gold mines. And you know my opinion on this too. The best PPP or major infrastructure project is usually boring too. No drama. No heroic recovery plan. No ministerial crisis. No contractor threatening to walk away. No board meeting that feels like a hostage...
6 days ago • 1 min read
The person across the table is rarely the real problem. The unresolved issue is. But once negotiations get tense, we forget that. We start blaming motives. Questioning competence. Building a case against the person. And from there, everything gets worse. Because when you turn the other side into the enemy, solving the issue becomes almost impossible. Bye, bye, partnership. The better approach is simple: Separate the person from the problem. Be hard on the issue. Clear on the facts. Direct...
7 days ago • 1 min read
January 2018. London. Whittington Hospital. A fire. It was controlled. Patients evacuated. The hospital continued operating. Crisis over? Not even close. The fire exposed a much bigger problem. There were serious disagreements. Condition of the building. The fire safety defects. Who was contractually responsible for fixing them. Etc. The NHS Trust said the PFI company had failed to remedy the problems. The PFI company disagreed. A “mis huevos” (ego battle) situation… Payments were withheld....
8 days ago • 1 min read
You opened the project on time. Construction is finished. The ribbon has been cut. The lenders are happy. The Board can finally breathe. And then operations begin. Good for you. This is what we want to be in a big project. A few months pass by, and suddenly you realize that you are handling a different kind of monster. The subcontractor starts interpreting the contract in its favour. Small issues become recurring issues. Performance reports say everything is fine, while cash is slowly leaking...
9 days ago • 1 min read